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Artemis and her Hounds

Artemis Hunting

Artemis and her Hounds

I’ve been waiting for it to snow in southern Wisconsin, so I could finish this painting, the fourth in my Greek Myth series, of the goddess of the hunt, Artemis.  My huntress has left the brilliant sunlight of Greece for northern climes and the peace of the snowy forest.    Last Sunday I skied in fresh snow on the hills of Governor Dodge State Park, where this landscape is set.  Today, I went skiing in Blue Mounds State Park in very warm weather.   I didn’t need my Norwegian sweater, so Artemis can keep it a while longer.

Here is a poem about the north, written by someone who is also Finnish, and shares my love of the north woods.

Driving at Night

Up north, dashboard lights of the family car

gleam in memory, the radio

plays to itself as I drive

my father plied the highways

while my mother talked, she tried to hide

that low lilt, that Finnish brogue,

in the back seat, my sisters and I

our eyes always tied to the Big Dipper

I watch it still

on summer evenings, as the fireflies stream

above the ditches and moths smack

into the windshield and the wildlife’s

red eyes bore out from the dark forests

we flew by, then scattered like the last  bit of star

light years before.

It’s like a different country, the past

we made wishes on unnamed falling stars

that I’ve forgotten, that maybe were granted

because I wished for love.

–Sheila Packa

 Artemis and her Hounds, Oil on Canvas, 22×28, Sold